


For House Aico

by ThePieIsALieWriting



Category: Paladins: Champions Of The Realm (Video Game)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-06-02 20:31:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19448995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThePieIsALieWriting/pseuds/ThePieIsALieWriting
Summary: Khan has just begun his new career as the Primus of House Aico. On his first day he must already prove himself by saving Lian from a group of bandits who kidnapped her.





	For House Aico

**Author's Note:**

> Canon background lore;
> 
> Khan:  
> The Patriarch of House Aico issued a challenge to his captains: hold the house's banner for as long as possible. Few were strong enough to last a day. The last captain to receive the test, a young man named Khan, held the banner for hours. As his arms tired, he beckoned to a common servant and asked her to take it from him, "Even though I must fall," he said, "the banner will remain." This was not test of strength, but one of loyalty to House Aico. Khan passed the test and proved himself worthy of command. Today, he serves Lian as advisor and protector. 
> 
> Lian:  
> After plotting to set herself up as the legitimate heiress to the Ruby Throne, nothing stood in Lian's way. Her sincere dedication to her family's legacy may have earned her the title of Scion, but her skill with the rifle is what won her the respect of her family's Royal Guard.  
> When the Magistrate called on all loyal houses to unite against the Resistance, she was honour-bound to accept, arriving from her far-off homeland to represent House Aico along with her faithful bodyguard and general, Khan.

Primus of House Aico: a very honorable title that could only belong to a man worthy of it. And that man had proven to be Khan.

He had been part of the Royal Guard for many dedicated years, even managing to climb the ranks to captain and leading his own troops. Now he had applied for an even higher rank: to becoming a direct guard of the Aico family members. Many before him had failed and even though Khan wondered if he could pass the challenge himself, he went in with pride and confidence.

Eventually, he too had to admit defeat, but he didn’t want to go down without keeping his respect to the family he worked for. Apparently, this was exactly what they had wanted to see from him.

After he had passed this test, he was put to work the same day. He was now standing in the throne room, guarding from one side of the room. The one on the Ruby Throne was now the oldest son of the former ruler and his wife, who both had tragically been murdered. The boy, too young and unexperienced to really be able to run the family’s forces and servants, had inherited the throne soon after his parents’ funeral. The Patriarch of House Aico: the man who was fully responsible for the Royal Guard and the approval of Khan’s succession during his challenge, was now standing in front of the throne, explaining what was happening to the young inheritor. The son had taken his new responsibility seriously and listened that what the man had to say. But the Patriarch was rather giving suggestions at this point, only asking for approval, because no one in the room seemed to believe the new successor really understood anything of what was being said.

One person in particular didn’t seem happy with the way things had turned out. Lian was sitting with crossed arms and legs on a second chair of royalty that was on the right side of the Ruby Throne, the place her mother used to sit during the meetings between her husband and his followers. She looked simply bored and unimpressed, probably not very faithful in her brother’s ruling capabilities.

After the meeting ended, Khan was tasked to escort Lian out of the Throne room and towards any destination she pleased. As they walked down the marble hallways, she shortly glanced over her shoulder at him. “An experienced soldier like you must have your own opinion about someone like my little brother inheriting the command over our troops, do you not?’’

“It’s not my place to give my opinion on that, your Highness.”

She lightly scoffed at that. It was clear that she had been testing him and he gave the best probable answer. He was pretty sure they had a similar view on the subject though. It just wouldn’t be appropriate, given the situation, to voice his thoughts.

After a moment of silence Lian her hand held up to her mouth as she elegantly yawned in boredom. “All that battle strategizing really is tiresome. I doubt any of those men have ever fought in a real war.” She reached for her tiara and shifted it back into proper position. “What a pain.” 

After a short pause she turned to her new bodyguard. “Let’s stop wasting time and go to the clay shooting range. I’m sure you could use the practice.” She noted probingly, looking him up and down.

“Of course, Princess.”

He followed behind her as they made their way down a red carpeted pair of enormous stairs and along a hallway towards the front door. It let into the inner courtyard within the walls that surrounded the palace. A stable boy brought them two horses and a little wooden step was placed down so Lian could gracefully get onto her steed. Khan got handed a beautifully handcrafted heirloom rifle, which he had to carry along. He climbed onto his horse as well and accompanied the Princess to the grass lands that also belonged to the Aico residence.

The horses trotted along a beautiful grassy hill which looked out over the thick forest that lied beyond. Once they reached their destination, Khan was going to step forward to offer a hand to respectfully help Lian off her horse. But surprisingly, she got off on her own. She looked out over the land, enjoying the view.

Without looking up, she reached her arm and beckoned for him to hand over her weapon. He did so and she looked over her rifle. It was a special item that had been passed down through the noble house for generations. Lian raised her weapon at the sound of a clay pigeon whizzing through the air. With clean precision, she shot it out of the sky. 

Khan watched from a distance as she kept practicing on the targets, not missing a single shot. He had to admit that he was impressed.

Lian reloaded her weapon before taking one more shot and then practically shoved it back into Khan’s hands. “It has an accuracy loss due to the grease. Get it cleaned up.”

“I’ll immediately get it taken care of, Princess.” He said, giving a very short nod before returning to his horse. There was a small cabin near the entrance of the gate that gave access to the grass fields. There he was sure he could find someone to get the matter taken care off.

The servant who had been responsible for launching the clay pigeons into the air, watched as the heavy armored bodyguard left to somewhere else. This was the perfect opportunity. He loaded the sling-like device with a pure white tinted clay piece, instead of the brownish-red ones. And launched it up. Lian watched with a raised eyebrow how the clay target whizzed through the air and landed on the grass far away. What was the imbecile doing? Couldn’t he realize she didn’t have her weaponry ready?

She looked back to see what was going on but found the device stationary abandoned. How strange. When she turned back, she was greeted by the sight of a group of men on horses approaching from the tree-lines. It had been a signal. 

There was no point in running, as her high heels would just get stuck in the dirt. She’d rather get attacked than look like a fool. She still took a few hesitant steps backwards as the men surrounded her, a shotgun immediately pointed at her face. “Would ya look at that boys, we got ourselves a pretty one this time.”

“Pretty rich.” Said a scruffy looking guy.

Lian gave a quick glance out of the corner of her eye towards the walls. They were just behind the hill, out of sight from anyone who could’ve possibly come to save her. She turned her attention back on her attackers. “If you’re out on money you can go rob our gold storages. I’m sure the guards will let you fill a few of your pockets before arresting you.” She remarked.

“We ain’t here for your shiny things, missy.” Said the man with the shotgun. “We’re here for _you_.” He nodded towards one of his men. “Now get on the horse with my buddy over here and we’ll take you along on a nice little trip.”

“If you really think I’m going to lower myself to even get close to that peasant, you’re seriously mistaken.”

Before she could act, one of the horses moved behind her. The man got off with one swift jump and grabbed her arms, turning them onto her back. Another placed his dirty hand over her mouth in case she would try to call for help. The horses impatiently tapped their hoofs. 

“Now come come, missy. He’s a nice fella. He doesn’t bite, trust me.” The man tied her hands together and pushed her forwards towards the horse. “If you just work with us, we’ll make sure you get back unharmed. If your family pays the coin for you of course.”

Khan frustratingly walked up to the little shop, knocking with the large parts of his helm into some hanging ornaments that served as decoration. This place seemed like it was built for dwarves. He bowed down a little so he could fit under it and frantically knocked on the wooden windows which were opened by a short little man. “What is it?” He asked in a high but hoarse voice.

“I need you to get this cleaned up.” Khan placed the rifle onto the counter.

The little man looked at it in vexation. However, he picked it up and used a cloth wrapped bore to start cleaning out the barrel of the gun. Khan straightened his back, bonking his head again on the low roof and waited patiently in that guarding like stance. The little man leaned with one elbow on the counter while he worked. 

“So uh, what you gonna hunt today? Deer? Wolves? _Gorlocks_?” He joked as the armored man didn’t seem in the mood to answer him anyways. “If you want, mister, I could call ol’ Johnny so you can practice on clay pigeons. He had a fever last week, but he said he was up to work again today.”

Khan looked at him dubiously. “I was just at the practice range.”

“I doubt that. Johnny was still coughing in bed this mornin’. The clay practice hasn’t been active for days.”  


But that meant...

Khan grabbed the weapon back out of the hands of the now confused little man. “Go alarm a guard immediately. The Princess is in danger.” He instructed before he rushed back to his horse. He spurred it as much as he could and galloped back to the grass plains. When he could look over the hill, his suspicions seemed true. Lian was gone.

He felt his stomach drop in a moment of utter disappointment. He couldn’t believe he had let himself be fooled this easily. But he had been trained to remain calm under any circumstances and suppressed the feeling. He got off his horse and noticed a rolled-up piece of paper that was pierced by a knife into the ground. He picked it up and unrolled it with his large hands.

It read in a terrible handwriting:

_If you want to get the girl back alive bring 5000 crystals to Hotwind Mill by the end of the week._

Khan crumbled the paper. A guard, accompanied with a couple of soldiers, approached him. “What’s going on Khan?”

He turned towards him and recognized the man as one of the soldiers he used to command. They were probably send to check what was going on, after the news of the Princess’s possible disappearance had reached them. He knew these men would respect him. But undoubtedly confess against him if they would be asked the question. He handed him the crumbled letter. “Bandits. They’ve taken the Princess. They’re asking for ransom money.”

The guard read over the message once himself. “We’ll immediately have to let the Ruby Throne know about this.” He rolled the letter up neatly and handed it to one of his men who immediately took off back to the walls.

“It was my responsibility to guard her. I’ll take the duty upon myself to get her back.”

“We should wait for his Highness’ approval.” Spoke a man in the back.

Khan looked at him in disbelief. Wait for that kid to approve? It would take at least a few minutes for the message to even reach him. Every second that passed meant harm could come to Princess Lian. “We must go now. Otherwise we- “

“He is right. We should wait.” Agreed the guard.

“ _I_ must go then.” Khan continued, not letting himself get interrupted. “They can’t have gone far. If I go now, I’ll still be able to follow their tracks.”

“You want to ignore the Throne’s command?”

He fell silent. Khan frowned doubtfully before grabbing his horse’s reigns and climbing back on, turning his back to his troops and facing the forest where the bandits must have gone to. He had made his decision. He started to spur his horse down the hill when the guard blocked his path. “You know I trust you with my life, sir. But you do realize this might cost you your current position and reputation, right?”

He simply stared back at him. The guard sighted. “I just hope you know what you’re doing. At least let two of my men accompany you, in case those bandits are armed.” Two soldiers’ horses stepped forward. 

“But I haven’t approved of your decision. And I don’t know anything about any of this.” The guard said warningly, suggesting he wasn’t going to speak up if Khan got in trouble. Khan simply nodded in gratitude before spurring his horse in a gallop down the hill, followed by the two others.

The soldiers had turned out to be rather useful as one of them pointed out horses’ hoofprints in the dirt between the trees. He predicted that it must have been a group of six or seven men. They followed the trail, which wasn’t too difficult since the mud was rather soft and left clear tracks. 

After they passed through the thick woods, the ground became more solid and the tracks had vanished. Luckily, they weren’t unfamiliar with the area. There was a lonely windmill, painted bright red like a lighthouse, that stood at the edge of the forest. There was an overgrown gravel path that let up to the abandoned structure. Hotwind Mill owed its mythical name to the warm South-Eastern wind, which was the only wind that came from the right direction to make the windmill turn. Now the cold Northern air just made the wood creak in protest.

“Are they here?” One of the men asked quietly.

“No, it wouldn’t make sense for them to have a hideout here. They could get too easily ambushed.” The soldiers nodded their heads. But Khan still agreed when one of them asked if he should go check just in case. He walked up to the windmill and held up a lantern to look through the broken windows. The horses neighed. There was no one.

The sun was starting to set and spread an orange glow across the Realm’s sky. The soldiers asked if they should go back. After all it was going to be dark soon and they weren’t even close to finding the bandits. But Khan refused to return without the Princess. ‘’If they’re not here… the only place they could have gone is Riotshard.’’ Khan thought out loud before turning to his men. ‘’We’ll make our way over there and ask the locals if they’ve seen anything.’’

Around midnight, the group of bandits arrived at their hideout. They stayed at an empty warehouse that was only reachable through some sketchy back alleys, so barely anyone ever got there. It was the perfect place for their criminal activities.

Even though Riotshard fell under the Magistrate, it wasn’t heavily guarded. Because of this, robberies and other gang hideouts were very common.

Lian couldn’t recall ever coming here before. The only reason she knew a peasant town like Riotshard even existed, was because it was well-known in the history books as the base of operations for multiple riots against the authorities. It was a rebelling little town, one she didn’t have any interest in.

The group lead their horses through the town. It was late and there was no one about on the streets. Aside from a few bars, there was no light on in any of the houses. Not that she expected to be heroically saved by anyone. Riotshard was nothing more than an industrial town inhabited by common foot folk. But seeing the state it was in, under the gloomy light of the broken moon, it made her dislike the place even more. The uncomfortable position she had to sit on the horse and the smell of the bandit that was tasked to taker her along with him made the experience a whole lot worse.

The bandits arrived through the back of the old warehouse. On the bottom floor they stalled their horses by tying the reigns to the large wooden pillars that supported the high building. They dismounted and one of them placed down a stack of hay for the animals. The man who had been tasked to take Lian with him, got off his horse first before helping her down. She couldn’t really do so herself with her hands tied after all. He picked her up from her waist and calmly put her down on her feet. They were surprisingly gentle with her, but only because she hadn’t made an attempt to fight back.

As the men went on doing their tasks, one of them forcefully took Lian by the arm and dragged her with him towards a pair of wooden stairs. She had realized he was the leader of this pack of savages and also the one she would enjoy hauling into court the most, once they were arrested. For now, she was going to have to bide her time and wait for her brother to send a group of soldiers to come get her.

The next room they entered was filled with a thick cloud of cigarette smoke. In the middle they had turned over a couple of crates to serve as seats and tables to play some gambling card games on. The bandit pushed Lian forward onto a stack of sugar filled sacks by the wall. It was extremely uncomfortable to sit, but better than having to share hear seat again with one of those savages.

The man simply left her there and went to sit with the others, grabbing himself a deck of cards to join their game. One of the bandits looked over his shoulder at her with a strange look. Lian simply narrowed her eyes at him, elegantly place one leg over the other as if she was sitting comfortably in a regular chair. She wasn’t some poor girl caught by a group of big scary men. She was a woman of royalty and authority. They were certainly going to learn that when she was going to decide the fate of their worthless little lives once she was rescued.

‘’Where’d you find this one, Grand?’’ The man asked as he turned back to look at his cards. ‘’Looks like a snobby bitch to me.’’

The leader, whose name was apparently Grand, played one of his cards. ‘’On the outskirts of sum fancy palace. From what our informants told us, the people got enough cash to pay for the pretty missy. We’ll have ourselves swimming in coin soon.’’

‘’You criminals are foolish to think that House Aico would sink so low to pay a bit of ransom money. A lifetime behind bars is the only payment you can expect.’’

The man looked at her again, his eyebrows pushed together in a questioning, dumb look. ‘’The House of the who now?’’

‘’Did I say you could speak?’’ Grand asked her sternly, not looking up from his cards.

‘’I don’t recall ordering you to take me hostage either. So I don’t think it really matters what anyone says.’’ Even though she was the victim here, Lian was still the Scion of House Aico and the one to command the lower.

The bandit now turned towards her as well. When Lian gave him nothing but a glare in response, he just rolled his eyes and went back to playing. The next man in the circle plopped down his winning card onto the stack with a chant and victoriously gathered the few golden pieces that had been betted. The big, vulgar mouthed guy slammed both his fists on the little wooden crate in frustration and got up from his seat. He walked up to Lian and pointed his finger at her face. However she didn’t flinch. ‘’Did you not hear Grand? He said to keep your mouth shut!’’

‘’Let the missy be, Brik. We need her for the coin, remember?’’

‘’I ain’t doing nothing.’’ He protested. As the others went back to play another round of their game, they ignored how he grabbed her chin and tipped her head upwards. ‘’It would be a shame to break such a pretty girl. Really pretty and with a lot of money. We like pretty girls like you.’’

He roughly brushed the corner of her mouth with his thumb as he let his fingers go through her soft white hair. He let his hand slowly go down from her face, to her neck and to-

The bandit held in a grunt of pain as Lian used her crossed legs to give him a good kick in the gut with the pointy tip of her shoe. His ugly face turned into a twitchy mess of anger. She simply stared back at him, unintimidated. The guy gave her a loud slap in the face.

‘’Brik, fucking seriously? What did I just say?’’ Grand got up from his seat and grabbed the guy by his collar. He pulled him away and gave him a push towards the staircase. ‘’Go grab a drink with the others or something, you sloop for brains. Come on, get the hell out.’’

The bandit grumpily complied and walked away. Grand turned towards the rest. ‘’Well? What are y’all staring at? Get a move on. Do something useful for once.’’ The men hurriedly scrambled from their seats and went on to do something.

Grand sighed tiredly as he moved the grate with the abandoned card game aside to make his way over to Lian. She hadn’t moved since she’d gotten that slap. The man bent down in front of her and took her chin in his hand to make her look up to him. There was a small trickle of blood in the corner of her mouth where she had bit down on her lip because of the smack. Grand took a piece of cloth from his pocket and dabbed it gently on the wound. Lian first tried to move away from his hands, but he tightened his grip on her. There was no point in struggling. She’d rather just sit quietly and fight her battle with this man through the power of her stare alone.

‘’I do hope for you that your family loves you enough to pay for you.’’ Grand noticed the light questioning look in her eyes. ‘’Because if I don’t get my money on time, we’ll just have to keep you here. And since you won’t be worth anything to me then, I’ll just let my boys do to you whatever they want.’’

Lian didn’t react to that. She knew better than letting herself get belittled by this man. When he finished, he met her cold gaze and smiled. ‘’They’re right, you are _very pretty_. I can see the beauty in a fierce missy like you.’’

In the meantime, Khan and his group had also arrived at Riotshard. After pursuing a few locals in the bars to tell them if they saw anything, they’d gotten word of a gang hideout. They left their horses a stable and made their way over to the warehouse. From their hiding position in one of the abandoned buildings they could see a group of men walking onto the streets. They seemed to be heading to one of the bars for a drink. They matched the descriptions for the people they were looking for. ‘’Follow them and see if you can get any information out of them. I’ll take a look inside in case the Princess is there.’’

The soldiers nodded and went to follow the bandits. Khan took one more look at the warehouse before him, where the men had come from. There had been a quite a few of them, but there might be even more inside. However, from here he couldn’t see what was going on inside. He decided to go get a closer look.

The hulking shadow moved through the narrow alleys towards a wooden side door that was connected to the building. There was a faint light glowing from under it and muffled voices. Khan peaked through a few gaps in the wood. He could see a couple of horses and two men leaning against a stone wall. He was trying if he could see more when there was a sudden startled gasp beside him. There was a younger bandit boy, who had gone out to get some water for the horses. Now he was standing face to face with the largest man he had ever seen. Khan really wasn’t suited for stealth…

‘’Oh shit.’’ The boy dropped the water bucket and ran. Khan charged forward with a single step and pushed the boy into the ground with enough pressure to break both his shoulder blades. The two men who were talking inside noticed the noise and reached for their guns. One of them carefully moved towards the door, uncertain of what was happening outside because it had gone completely silent again. Just as he reached for the door handle, it swung open and the boy got flung into him. The other man raised his weapon, but before he could shoot an enormous armored hand grabbed the gun out his grip. Then that same fist immediately slammed back into his face and the man fell dead onto the ground.

Upstairs both Grand and Lian turned their head towards the noise. It took a second before Grand sighed in annoyance and turned towards his men, who had also heard the commotion. ‘’We’re getting attacked! Get down there and kill them already!’’

Grand pointed to one of them. ‘’Not you. You stay here and make sure she doesn’t go anywhere.’’

He then too took out a giant machete from a holster on his back, and climbed over the railing of the third floor and jumped down to join the fight. The man that stayed behind pulled Lian up and wrapped his arm around her so she couldn’t run, while holding his weapon with his other hand. ‘’You’re coming with me.’’

‘’Let go of me you peasant.’’ She snapped. But there was no way to fight him with her hands still tied.

But Khan had heard her. That was the Princess, she was here. Khan looked up at the stairs, only to see a bunch of bandits coming down to meet him. He quickly moved behind one of the pillars as the bandits stopped on their way down and opened fire in his direction. He wasn’t going to hold long in this position, the pillar was simply too thin, causing a few bullets to hit and reflect against his armor. They also had the high ground. There was no way he was going to win a long ranged fight. Khan gathered his momentum and charged from his cover, immediately getting sprayed with bullets. With full force he slammed his shoulder into the wooden pillar that supported the stairs, causing it to snap and the whole bunch crashed down. Pleased with this victory, Khan looked up to think of a way to on how he got up there now. When a dark figure jumped down from floors high and crashed feet first into Khan. A large blade slashed for his face, but he managed to block it. Khan got a good hold onto the attacker and flung him off of him. Grand quickly recovered his footing however and swung his machete, ready for another attack. Khan aimed his gun at the man’s head and fired almost a whole clip. Grand avoided most of them and took cover behind a pillar, but one pullet stroke through his leather armor and bore into his left shoulder. He grunted in pain.

Khan took this opportunity to climb the rubble of wood so he could get high enough to get onto the other level of the staircase that was still intact. There he found three more men who rushed down to come help their leader. Khan took a wooden box and launched into them, like it was nothing more than a ball he had to toss. This knocked the men off their feet, giving him enough time to put a bullet in their head each. He charged up the next pair of stairs. As soon as he got up, another bandit pointed his gun at him.

‘’Not so fast big boy!’’ He then pressed the barrel of the gun to the side of Lian’s head. ‘’One step closer and your girl is dead.’’

‘’Took you long enough to come get me.’’ Lian remarked calmly.

‘’Shut the hell up.’’ He threatened. ‘’Now, put down your weapon and I won’t blow her head off her body.’’

Khan hesitated. He didn’t feel like disarming himself, but if he didn’t comply the Princess would get hurt. Not that they wouldn’t hurt her even after he wouldn’t be able to shoot them anymore. But he didn’t really have a choice. Khan slowly put his gun on the ground.

‘’And the other weapon too!’’

He was confused for a second before he remembered he also had Lian’s weapon with him. He took the heirloom rifle off his back and also placed it down. Khan held up both his hands in surrender and a crooked smile formed onto the bandit’s lips. A sharp cut sliced into Khan’s back and the guard fell onto his knees. Grand stood behind him, his machete dripping with blood. ‘’There we go. So much for heroically saving your little princess all on your own.’’ He kicked Khan against his helmet. The metal slammed against his head hard enough to disorientate him. Grand gave him a rough push with his foot, so Khan rolled onto his injured back.

‘’Now what do we do?’’

Grand huffed mockingly at the sight of the defeated guard. ‘’I’ll just finish this one off. We’ve drawn way too much attention though, so we’ll have to leave Riotshard.’’ He looked at Lian for a short moment. ‘’Kill the girl too. She’d be too much of a burden to take with us.’’

The bandit laughed as he pushed Lian onto the ground. There was nothing she could do but stare at the gun that was aimed right in between her eyes. At that moment Khan let out a battle shout has he grabbed Grand by the neck and slammed him down. The wood splintered under the impact. He ripped the machete out of his hands and threw it towards the other criminal. The blade pierced right through his body.

Lian stared at the dead body that dropped next to her onto the floor, before focusing back to the fight between the two men. Grand won the battle of strength and managed to push Khan off of him. The royal guard got up his shield right before the bandit could cut through his armor with a second knife he had on him.

As the two men struggled to overpower one another, Lian moved towards the dead body. She used the machete that was standing upright in the blooded flesh to free herself from her handcuffs.

Khan shield lost its charge and Grand pushed his knife to his neck. It was only centimeters away from killing him, because Khan managed to hold him back with his hands. But he wouldn’t hold this for long. His grip weakened and he tip of the knife came closer and closer to his throat. Grand suddenly screamed in pain as Lian stuck the machete deep into his side. It gave the exact amount of time needed for Khan to grab the bandit by his throat push him up against the wall.

‘’Stay behind me, Princess!’’ Khan called out just before Grand pulled his blade out of his own body and stuck it into the metal chest plate. It stuck through it, but didn’t go deep enough to harm him. It gave Grand enough momentum to get out of Khan’s grip. With a final punch he unbalanced his stance and the guard tripped backwards, through the wooden railing and fell all the way down. 

Grand turned towards the last person that was left to face him. Lian had picked her rifle from the floor and aimed it right at him. Grand laughed. ‘’You are a fierce missy, I’ll give you that. But not enough to kill me. Because I will have your throat sliced before you even pull the trigger.’’

He charged forward with his machete aimed right for the middle of her throat. But it didn’t cut through. It just stopped, like he tried to poke a stone wall. With eyes filled of confusion he looked up at the golden glow that surrounded her body.

‘’Don’t you remember who I am? I am the Scion of House Aico.’’ Her feet were lifted up from the ground. A powerful glow surged through her weapon. ‘’Do you know what you do when you see a Princess?’’

Grand’s eyes opened wide in shock.

‘’You _kneel_.’’

An ear deafening blast boomed through the entire building. Khan sat upright at the sight of a golden explosion that came from the top floor. ‘’Princess!’’ He climbed back up the stairs, worry drowning out all the pain in his body. ‘’Princess?!’’

Lian looked up at an exhausted Khan who charged up the stairs towards her. She stood gracefully and unharmed, her heirloom rifle resting against her shoulder. ‘’As I said, it was about time you came to get me.’’

Khan was practically stunned as she nonchalantly walked past him. Grand was nowhere to be found, probably gone up in ashes. He slowly looked at Lian, who was waiting for him already half way down the stairs. ‘’Well, are you coming? I think it’s only right for you to safely escort me back home.’’

He simply nodded. ‘’Of course, Princess.’’

She turned to continue her way down, when suddenly Khan lifted her up. ‘’What are you doing? This isn’t what I meant!’’

He ignored her commands and carried her down. There was no hard work for him in carrying her on one arm.

‘’I am perfectly capable of walking myself, you know.’’

‘’I know, Princess. I’ve seen that you can take care of yourself just fine.’’ Lian crossed her arms stubbornly, not yet convinced that he had any right in carrying her back home against her will. ‘’But after such a horrid experience its possible that you’re hurt. So I’ll take you back without any possibilities of worsening your conditions. Making sure you return home safely is the least I can do as a final deed.’’

‘’What do you mean?’’

Khan now finally looked down at her. ‘’I have come to rescue you without being commanded to do so. I very possibly broke my loyalty to the Ruby Throne.’’

Lian frowned at that. ‘’A needed deed like that shows more loyalty than obeying any order. And besides, my brother can’t dismiss any of my personal guards without my consent.’’

‘’I… am not a personal guard, Princess.’’

‘’You are now. I just promoted you to it. You should be grateful, instead of questioning me.’’

Khan was silent for a moment. ‘’I am grateful, Princes.’’

‘’Good. But you must know, to never disobey any of my commands. Ever.’’

‘’I don’t see the point in ever betraying you, Princess.’’

‘’Then put me back down.’’

Khan stopped walking. He gazed down at the woman in his arms, who looked back at him with a challenging look in her eyes. ‘’Is it treason to assure your safety and health?’’

‘’…no.’’

‘’Then I shall carry you back.’’ He continued on his way.

Lian smirked. ‘’Are you testing me, Khan?’’

‘’I would never, Princess.’’


End file.
